Fewer Patients Have Been Dying From Hospital Errors Since Obamacare Started

[LiberalArkie]

By Jonathan Cohn



Hospitals have cut down on deadly medical errors, saving around 87,000 lives since 2010, according to a new government report.

Pinning down the precise reasons for this change is difficult, to say nothing of predicting whether the decline will continue. Improvement has slowed in just the last year, the report suggests. But many analysts think government initiatives within the Affordable Care Act have played a significant role in the progress so far.

In short, Obamacare may literally be saving lives.

The new report comes from Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, which is part of the Department of Health and Human Services and is something like an in-house think tank dedicated to making medical care safer and more effective. Since 2010, the agency has been tracking the incidence of common and frequently fatal medical errors, which include everything from a nurse accidentally giving a patient the wrong medication to a doctor inserting an intravenous line in a way that leads to a blood-borne infection.

Snip

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/patient-safety-obamacare_565dcb8ce4b072e9d1c34a57

[Xipe Totec]

1. Read "The Checklist Manifesto"

The modern world has given us stupendous know-how. Yet avoidable failures continue to plague us in health care, government, the law, the financial industry—in almost every realm of organized activity. And the reason is simple: the volume and complexity of knowledge today has exceeded our ability as individuals to properly deliver it to people—consistently, correctly, safely.

We train longer, specialize more, use ever-advancing technologies, and still we fail. Atul Gawande makes a compelling argument that we can do better, using the simplest of methods: the checklist. In riveting stories, he reveals what checklists can do, what they can’t, and how they could bring about striking improvements in a variety of fields, from medicine and disaster recovery to professions and businesses of all kinds. And the insights are making a difference.

Already, a simple surgical checklist from the World Health Organization designed by following the ideas described here has been adopted in more than twenty countries as a standard for care and has been heralded as “the biggest clinical invention in thirty years” (The Independent).

http://www.amazon.com/The-Checklist-Manifesto-Things-Right/dp/0312430000

[LiberalArkie]

4. Back about 2005 I cut the fingers on my left hand almost off with a miter saw.

I went to the hospital. They unbandaged my hand and put a big X with a marker on my left hand and arm. The nurses put a bandage back on my hand to stem the bleeding. I was wheeled in to surgery. They set up an iv on my left arm. Then they set up a support kind go thing on my right and strapped my right arm down.

I asked the nurse why was my right arm strapped down. She said so the surgeon could operate on your hand, you know with the cut up fingers. I wiggled my fingers and told her that I thought my right hand was pretty good, but my left one is in pretty bad shape. They knocked me out. But the surgeon did do my left hand I found out when I woke up.

I always wondered what would have happened if I had not asked the nurse about it.

[Xipe Totec]

5. You might enjoy watching the movie "Sour Grapes"

I won't spoil it for you.

Suffice it to say, surgery is involved.

[hedgehog]

2. Kind of sideways from the OP - but medical records sharing has meant

fewer blood draws and repeat lab tests for me as my various doctors share their info.

[HuckleB]

7. +1,000,000 ... 000

Yeah, that's huge, and it's most important for people later in life, when they may be more confused about what is happening. Working to help my parents with their health care is like a second job as a case manager.

[louis-t]

3. The Horror!

[Bucky]

6. That doesn't mean it's not the worst thing since slavery

l'sigh